With his beyond-youthful looks and slim build, Nathan Martinez has the baby-face angle down cold. It just took the opportunity presenting itself for him to get the assassin angle down just as easily.

Enter Saturday night against SCIAC rival Chapman, the team that has shared four of the last six conference titles with Martinez’s University of Redlands. When Redlands starting quarterback Levi Plante went down with an undisclosed injury midway through the first quarter, Martinez embraced the opportunity.

And Bulldogs fans fell in love with the result. Martinez, his 5-foot-10, 160-pound build, and his baby face added the assassin label to his resume, piloting Redlands to a decisive 39-26 victory over what figures to be its chief rival for the SCIAC title.

A Yucaipa High product, Martinez was an efficient 16 of 22 for 257 yards and three touchdowns, pacing the Bulldogs to season highs in total yardage (517), passing yardage (257) and rushing yardage (260). Along with that, Redlands held the ball for a season-best 41:17, thus keeping Chapman’s potent offense off the field.

This displayed not only Martinez’s preparation and next-level thinking as a backup but Redlands coach Mike Maynard’s decision to stay with the sophomore Martinez and play to his strengths.

“The job of a quarterback is to make good decisions and to move the chains and that’s really what Nathan does,” Maynard said. “He moves the ball well, he has great command of the offense and he’s the guy who always prepares as if he’s going to be the starter. That’s a cliche, but so many quarterbacks don’t. They think ‘I’m not going to play or get my chance.’ But he has prepared since the day he got here as a freshman to be ready to go into the game.”

As for Martinez, while he was initially surprised to get the call, he proved the baby-faced assassin has a PhD mentality toward his role.

“You’re not always going to get all the reps in practice during the process, but you have to trust the process,” Martinez said. “You have to get mental reps, you have to watch the guys, you have to ask questions. You’re not always going to be the one working, but you can always work.”

Ortega takes softball reins at Redlands

Redlands didn’t go far finding its next softball coach, hiring former Riverside City College associate head coach Jose Ortega to take over on Monday.

Ortega brings a complete resume to Redlands, having handled fundraising, recruiting and scouting along with his coaching duties. An RCC and University of San Diego product and former infield coach in the Cleveland Indians organization, Ortega spent the 2015-16 seasons as an assistant at UC Riverside, where he helped the Highlanders break school records in team batting average, hits, runs and wins.

RCC football coach Tom Craft has been at this coaching craft 41 years, or more than twice as long as most of his players have been alive. Yet, even this old dog is open to new tricks when it comes to practice.

Yes, practice. This season, Craft changed the schedule and nature of the Tigers’ practices, incorporating a recovery day on Thursdays and having full-pads practice on Fridays — one day before game day.

That recovery day follows two days in full pads and merely includes a walk-through in helmets, where the Tigers are off the field in about an hour.

“This is something everyone in college football is doing and (UCLA coach) Chip Kelly is the one who started doing it,” Craft said. “We checked with a lot of Olympic coaches on what they do during the week to get their athletes to perform at the top and that’s what they do. They have a recovery day.”

And what’s being said about a 4-1 RCC team is Craft’s new plan works. Coming into this week’s game with Grossmont, the Tigers are averaging 48 points a game.

“We’ve scored every time on our first series and we’ve been able to jump on people. I’ve noticed a big difference and I think our opponents and the officials have too,” Craft said.

Keep an eye on

• California Baptist swimmer Emily Longfellow, who won five events in the Lancers’ season-opening meet, the PCSC Pentathlon in La Mirada. Longfellow won the 100-yard butterfly, the 100 back, the 100 breaststroke, the 200 individual medley and the long individual medley relay.

• The Cal Baptist men’s water polo team, which earned its highest NCAA ranking — 14th. All seven of CBU’s losses have come to top-20 teams, with four coming to top-10 teams. Meanwhile, the Lancers have six players with at least 20 points and two top-20 victories of their own: No. 15 George Washington and No. 17 San Jose State.

• Cal State San Bernardino soccer players Danny Ortiz and Gabby Evaristo, who were named CCAA Players of the Week. Ortiz scored twice and added three assists in a pair of road shutouts of Humboldt State and Sonoma State. Evaristo scored both of the Coyotes’ goals in their 2-1 victory at Humboldt State. She has three goals on only 10 shots this season.

• Redlands soccer forward Kayvon Parsa, who was named SCIAC Offensive Athlete of the Week for the second time. Parsa scored all five goals in the Bulldogs’ 2-1 victory over Whittier and 3-0 blanking of UC Santa Cruz.

• Redlands water polo utility player Jasen Swan, who was named SCIAC Defensive Athlete of the Week for his five blocks, three steals and a forced exclusion in the Bulldogs’ 4-0 week.